Meet the Environmental Workforce Collaborative
by Finley West
The Environmental Workforce Collaborative is a Ventura County nonprofit collective dedicated to supporting and strengthening our region’s natural ecosystems and the people residing within them, demonstrating the transformative power of local partnerships and our community’s resilience after disaster.
The EWC is a partnership between the Concerned Resource & Environmental Workers (The C.R.E.W.), Safe Passage Youth Foundation, the Santa Monica Mountains Fund, the Ventura Regional Fire Safe Council, Los Padres ForestWatch, and the Ventura County Community Foundation, made possible with funding support from Edison International.
Convened in the wake of the 2017 Thomas Fire and the 2018 Hill and Woolsey Fires, the EWC has focused its work on areas impacted by these devastating events. As a result, the collaborative carries out boots-on-the-ground efforts concentrated on the recovery and preparation of fire-prone areas in our region. The scope of the EWC’s work involves habitat restoration, wildfire prevention, home hardening, workforce development, community education, and more. As shared at our recent In-Person Lunch & Learn featuring talks and a panel of our EWC partners, transformational strides have been made towards a more fire resilient future for Ventura County.
As we near the end of the collaborative’s second year of work, the EWC has successfully restored or treated more than 1,000 acres serving over 127,000 people; cleared over 202 cubic yards of vegetation while transplanting 1,100+ native plant species; and operated 19 forest cleanup events. Alongside this, nearly 800 home hardening assessments have been completed, leading to 18 Firewise USA Certified Neighborhoods.
We’ve also seen incredible growth in youth conservation corps, with over 400 students engaged through school pollinator gardens. As a result, over 61 jobs and career opportunities have been created across all partner organizations, which has helped empower The C.R.E.W. and programs like Safe Passage’s Conejo Youth Conservation Corps to grow their teams and extend employment opportunities to eligible youth, offering career support to these future environmentalists.
These metrics represent an immense level of success with the program, changing lives within our community for the better beyond measure, with the closing of our second year expected to yield even further achievements. Through the efforts of all EWC partners, there has been incredible progress made on building a foundation for a better prepared and healthier environment for Ventura County, one that is more robust and better fit to withstand natural disasters. As part of a three-year grant opportunity, we anticipate the third year to continue these efforts towards a stronger, healthier environment in Ventura County.
